with Laraaji
Features a special home-recorded session from New York-based musician, mystic and laughter meditation practitioner Laraaji, who has just released his new album Sun Piano.
Features a special home recorded session from New York based musician, mystic and laughter meditation practitioner Laraaji, who's just released his new album Sun Piano.
He grew up playing gospel and church music in 1950s New Jersey. To begin with he would imitate his favourite piano players, such as Fats Domino, Errol Garner, Ahmad Jamal and Oscar Peterson, before moving onto writing his own choral and doo-wop pieces whilst still in high school. From 1962 to 1964, he attended Howard University in Washington DC where he studied music theory and composition with a piano major, and he met Curtis Mayfield, Donny Hathaway and Bobby Timmons.
At college he took a left turn into comedy, which led him to the nightclub stand-up circuit in New York City. During this period he compered at the legendary Apollo Theater in Harlem, warming up for artists such as Barry White and Roberta Flack, appeared in a theatre production alongside a young Morgan Freeman, and had a bit part in cult film Putney Swope wih Antonio Fargas. By the early-70s he was working at the Aquarius Coffee Shop in Park Slope, Brooklyn, and playing Fender Rhodes electric piano in a fusion band, The Winds Of Change. In the mid-70s a spiritual awakening led him to trade his guitar in for an autoharp, and he began to play more freeform, cosmically inclined improvisations on the streets of New York City. Brian Eno saw him playing one night in Washington Square Park and invited him to record an album for his seminal Ambient series (Ambient 3: Day Of Radiance, released 1980).
In the 80s Laraaji self-released a prolific series of experimental home-recorded cassette albums which were sold on the street, in psychic bookstores and new age ‘head shops’. More recently he has appeared on recordings with Pharoah Sanders, Bill Laswell and Jonathan Wilson, and released collaborative albums with a younger generation of artists including Blues Control, Sun Araw and Dallas Acid.
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Music Played
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Kakai Kilonzo & The Kilimambogo Brothers
Mwiitu Beth
- No Wahala Sounds.
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Mammal Hands
Chaser
- Gondwana.
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Jessy Lanza
Ice Creamy
- Hyperdub.
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Kisk
Your Face (Lopazz & Casio Casino Remix) (feat. Robert Owens)
- Apparel Music.
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Vivian 'Yabby You' Jackson
Run Come Rally (Version)
- Pessure Sounds.
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IamI
UK Drift (Original Mix)
- 1HX.
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Future Islands
For Sure
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Naked Roommate
Je Suis Le Bebe
- Upset The Rhythm.
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Alabaster dePlume
Visit Croatia
- International Anthem.
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Adrian Younge, Ali Shaheed Muhammad
Down Deep (feat. Doug Carn)
- Jazz Is Dead.
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Bismillah Khan
Shehnai
- Odeon.
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Gajek
When You Play The Flute, But Your Mother Is Like...
- Throttle Records.
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Laurence Pike
Nero
- The Leaf Label.
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Laraaji
Gracefully (Piano Improv)
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Laraaji
Lively (Piano Improv)
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Laraaji
March Softly (Piano Improv)
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Laraaji
Shenandoah (Piano Theme & Improv)
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Laraaji
Zither Celestial (Electronic Zither Imrpov)
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Brijean
Moody
- Ghostly International.
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Vanessa Worm
Bones And Blood
- Optimo.
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Aziz Balouch
Granadina Arabe Del Siglo IX
- Death Is Not The End.
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Shirley Collins
Barbara Allen
- Domino.
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Jon Hassell
Delicado
- Jon Hassell.
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Georgia
Underpass
- Youth.
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ELWD
Where R My Glasses
- Bad Taste.
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Babyfather
Manna
- World Music.
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Slacs Bianci
Breeze (feat. Garton)
- The Pit London.
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Schmeichel
HRZN
- Vary.
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YTAC
Carbon
- Camp.
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Angelo Vanotti
Sketches In Anderland
- Numero Group.
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Whitesquare
I've Been Here Before
- Life And Death.
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Million Square
Jenova
- Max Luthert.
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±Ê´Ç³Ùé
Pearls
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Zoo Look
Direct Contact
- E-Beamz.
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Anunaku & Dj Plead
Wheele
- AD93.
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4THSEX
Line851 (Express)
- Timetable Records.
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Jorge B
A3
- Jack Dept.
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Elisa Bee
Orbit
- Balkan Digital.
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Yant
Hydro 1
- Blackaxon.
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Ela Minus
They told us it was hard, but they Were Wrong (DJ Python Little Peak)
- Domino.
Broadcast
- Fri 31 Jul 2020 21:00Â鶹ԼÅÄ Radio 6 Music